


The Sun Only Shines When Someone Blows the Clouds Away.

by theentityyousee



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: Dan is kinda sad, M/M, Minor Character Death, and phil is a flat character, but i did a bad job portraying it, mentions of abuse, whoops
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-07
Updated: 2017-03-07
Packaged: 2018-09-30 08:39:06
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,356
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10158992
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theentityyousee/pseuds/theentityyousee
Summary: Dan has trust issues and terrible parents. Phil is there to help.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, so I wrote this in an hour, forgive typos and read the tags. I am sorry the title is shit. No but really, this is kind of terrible. It's because I needed something while I work on a kind of long AU I recently started. Whatever.

Dan's life has never been colorful. When he was three, his family got a in a car crash. His parents died, and he was severely injured. Now he doesn't really remember much of his parents, but occasionally he'll have a flash of something pass behind his eyelids, a fluid memory of something, that he knows must be his lost family.

No one wanted a broken child, so he was passed around in the foster care system for three years until finally, finally, someone adopted him.

He knows three years isn't that long compared to other kids, but waking up in a new home every other month at the young age of four has definitely given him trust issues. He's never describe himself as a sunshine child.

When he turned seven, he was overjoyed to be adopted by a kind looking woman and her slightly less kind looking husband. It was his dream come true. A new home! A new family! A bed that could be his for longer than two months!

The dream quickly shattered. Now that he was steadily going to a school, he couldn't blame the constant switching for his grades. And if there was one thing these new parents wanted, it was good marks in every single subject. They wanted to raise a successful man who could care for them in their old age.

Not just good marks. He couldn't have a single fail. Or they'd call him ungrateful and take him by the wrists to the kitchen and make him wish he was locked in a bathroom stall with his bullies.

Dan tried, of course he tried. With pressure like that, how could he not? Well, for starters, he could become a teenager. Then he'd skip school to avoid the bullies, and he'd neglect coming home to avoid a different set of bullies.

When he did eventually come home, he'd pay dearly for leaving. But in his mind, those two random days of freedom were all he needed.

Now he's seventeen, somehow still acing school despite the skipping, and trying to sate his parents' desire for him to get into Cambridge or something. Yeah, it's not happening.

Wednesday morning he packs up for school, waves his father goodbye before leaving, and walks straight away from the direction of the he's found a home in the woods behind the nearby park, the only home that hasn't yet betrayed him to disappointment.

Well, until he sees blue eyes looking at him from a nearby tree, and then he hears the blood rushing in his ears at the sheer hatred he feels towards this person who has found his safe spot.

He knows it isn't rational. He's not a rational person.

"Hey, you!" He yells into the trees. A boy slightly taller than Dan scampers out, messy black hair and the same blue eyes as he's seen earlier.

"You called?"

"Are you the only one here? Why are you even here? I don't know you!" He throws his hands up into the air, simultaneously void of emotion, angry, and about to cry.

"I don't at all see how those last two things are related... but I'm alone, no, why should I know you, and I'm here because I'm skipping school. Oh, and my name is Phil."

"Same one as down the road?"

"Yeah! Do you go there too?"

Dan is again wary of this boy, knowing he could spill his secret hideout's location to anyone he wanted at school. It's paranoid, but at this point in his life, being paranoid is normal.

"Technically." Phil doesn't push him to expand on that, so Dan tentatively puts a little mental tick of friendliness next to his face.

They both climb back up into the tree Phil was in earlier, Dan struggling not to pay attention to how Phil's legs bent under his jeans.

"So... what's your name?"

"Dan."

Phil snaps his finger with a look of intense concentration on his face. "Oh yeah! Howell, right? The one Kevin's always picking on? No wonder you're skipping school."

"Glad to know that's my legacy." Dan replies dryly. He intends to leave it a that, but his curiosity acts up. "Why are you skipping?"

"Me? Exams I didn't study for. I'm gonna study today and go to the exams tomorrow."

Dan cracks a smile against his will. His self control so far has been non-existent around Phil, and he finds he doesn't mind it. Still, he forces his face back into a frown.

"What're you doing with your face, Dan?"

"Uh, nothing?"

"It must be malfunctioning, then. I've heard faces do that sometimes."

Dan can't tell if Phil is trying to be funny or just is crazy, so he accepts the first option as more reasonable (although you never know with those hangs-in-the-woods-alone types (that's what he thinks until he realizes he is one of those people too)) and laughs.

And he doesn't stop laughing, as Phil looks like his face has been split from the shock of seeing Dan laugh. "I've never seen you smile," he tells him, before he tells another joke just to watch the laughter go on longer. It's a dumb knock-knock about an oven, but it does the trick.

Phil laughs too, which makes Dan giggle harder. Dan has no idea what's wrong with himself, but thinking of how he hasn't really laughed with anyone his whole life doesn't even put a slight damper in his mood.

"Phil... Philllllllll-"

"What?"

"I can't breathe." He pouts at Phil, and it's probably the tear running down from his watering eyes that make it look like Phil is blushing.

"Figures. You've just laughed for, like, ten minutes straight."

"It has not been that long!"

"Whatever. I guess you needed to get it out, huh?"

"Yeah. I guess." Suddenly Dan isn't laughing anymore, or even smiling, and Phil takes it personally. He hugs Dan and Dan squeaks and stiffens, which makes Phil just hug him tighter. Eventually Dan relaxes.

"So, Phil... tell me about your family."

Phil starts talking, which leads to Dan talking, and they both rant at each other and by the time the sun sets, Dan thinks maybe he's got a friend.

Although when they get off the tree and Phil leans forward to peck his cheek, Dan thinks maybe he's got something more.

\----

"PHILLLLLL? ARE YOU HERE?"

"Yeah, yeah, stop yelling."

"Good. Does my hair look okay?"

"Yes! Dan, it looks fine. Great, even."

"Thanks!"

Phil rolls his eyes as Dan places and overly dramatic and wet kiss on his cheek. Phil wipes it away with a look of exaggerated disgust.

"Now, come on. We don't want to be late to your own graduation."

"Hmph." But Dan turns around and marches himself to the door, into the car which Phil is supposed to use to drive him to his college graduation. It's our of the way enough that he can't take the bus, and far enough to not get a taxi. So he's stuck dragging Phil there two hours early in their car.

Using his baby-talk voice, Phil says,"good boy! I knew you could do it!" And pats Dan's hair.

"I'm sure you've messed it up now."

"It looks cuteeeee!"

"You have to say that."

"It's true though."

Dan shakes his head in defeat and stares at the narrow road in front of them as Phil starts the engine. He's really grateful to be graduating intact, glad that having Phil helped him back into a happy place, into a place where he trusted someone enough to tell them about his parents' disciplinary methods, and trusted him enough to believe he could get out of it.

Thanks to Phil his parents got reported. Dan never would have done it. Now they have a restraining order and he has a new life. He isn't disappointed to have another set of parents taken from him, because this time it symbolizes a new phase in his life rather than the same old rehashed parental bullshit his childhood had been.

And in the end, he got a best friend and a happy life (so far). It's only looking up.

**Author's Note:**

> Excuse Phil's 2Dness and Dan's clicheness, I really did write it in an hour. With no outline or plan.


End file.
